Marquee

Marquee turns a Google Nest Hub into a clean now-playing display for Plex, Emby, or Jellyfin. It shows artwork, title, plot, genres, ratings, media details, progress, and a clock, then returns the Hub to ambient mode when playback stops.

Seven templates, per-block colors and fonts, every block movable — your setup will not look like anyone else's.

Templates

Seven layouts, switchable live from the settings page:

Spotlight — poster beside the full metadata stack	Hero — big centered title over the backdrop
Lower Third — broadcast-style chyron over full-bleed art	Big Clock — ambient timepiece with a now-playing strip
Street — a living night scene: your poster in a bulb-lit marquee, the logo sprayed on brick, real weather on the wall	Split — hard split: full-height art wall beside the info column
Fanart — fanart.tv artwork rotating on a blank canvas; add only the blocks you want (free API key required)

Every template is built from the same set of blocks — backdrop, clock, weather, title, metadata, plot, ratings, progress, poster — and every block carries its own position, size, font, and color per template, so a nudge in Spotlight never moves anything in Street.

The settings page is the card

Settings v2 has no wall of options. The card fills the page; you edit what you're looking at.

• Tap anything. Tap a block on the live preview — or its chip below — and the editor shows just that block's controls: font, color, position, width, size, plus whatever it owns (clock style and seconds, weather effects and intensity, which metadata pieces show, logo art vs text title). Tap the card's empty background to edit the backdrop.
• The chips tell the truth. One pill per block on the card: × takes it off, "+ Add" brings anything back. When a block is on your card but has nothing to show for the current title — no scores yet, an emptied metadata line — its chip goes dim and the editor says so, instead of letting you adjust an element that isn't on screen.
• Bottle a look, share it, credit travels. "Save preset" snapshots your whole layout onto the template carousel. "Share this look" copies it as a small setup file — credited to you — and anyone who imports it gets it on their carousel tagged with your name, one tap from applied. Locations and credentials never ride along.
• A guided tour, once. First run walks you through the six things that matter, spotlighting the real interface — then gets out of the way.
• Phones are first-class. The preview pins to the top at a size that leaves room to work, and the on-screen keyboard can never cover it.

Features

• Live now-playing card from Plex, Emby, or Jellyfin; casts to a Nest Hub and hands it back to ambient mode when playback stops.
• Seven templates, including Street (animated night scene with rain, snow, smoke-fog, and storms that follow your real weather, intensity 1–4) and Fanart (rotating fanart.tv art on a blank canvas).
• Every block — clock, weather, title, plot, ratings, progress, poster — addable, removable, and movable per template, each with its own font and color. Tap it on the live preview to edit it.
• Presets and "Share this look": snapshot a layout, or export it as a small credited file others import in one tap. Credentials never ride along.
• Session filters (users, devices, a "do not cast" word list) and rotation when multiple sessions play.
• A six-step guided tour on first run; settings persist in /config; /healthz for monitoring.

What You Need

• Docker
• A Plex, Emby, or Jellyfin server on the same LAN
• A Google Nest Hub on the same LAN
• A Plex X-Plex-Token (or an Emby / Jellyfin API key)

Marquee is designed for a trusted LAN. It has no login and should not be port-forwarded.

Quick Start

Edit the example IP addresses and token in compose.yaml, then run:

docker compose up -d --build
docker compose logs -f marquee

Open http://SERVER-IP:8084/. The card served to the Hub is http://SERVER-IP:8084/image.

If you prefer plain Docker:

docker build -t marquee:local .
docker run -d --name marquee --restart unless-stopped --network host \
  -e PAGE_URL=http://192.168.1.10:8084/image \
  -e PLEX_HOST=http://localhost:32400 \
  -e PLEX_TOKEN=replace-me \
  -v marquee-config:/config \
  marquee:local

Settings persist under ./data in Compose mode or /config in the container.

Configuration

Required environment variables:

• PAGE_URL — this server's LAN IP + /image. The Hub loads this URL, so localhost will not work here.
• PLEX_HOST — keep http://localhost:32400 when Plex runs on the same machine; otherwise its LAN IP
• PLEX_TOKEN

Choosing the media backend

Plex is the default. Marquee can poll an Emby or Jellyfin server instead — same card, same settings, same filters. Pick it on the settings page (Media server panel: backend dropdown + address + key; each backend keeps its own stored pair, changes apply ~5s after Save, no restart), or via env: MEDIA_BACKEND=emby with EMBY_HOST/EMBY_API_KEY, or MEDIA_BACKEND=jellyfin with JELLYFIN_HOST/JELLYFIN_API_KEY. Keys and tokens are write-only: stored server-side, never sent back to a browser, never in Export. Only PAGE_URL is required at startup — a container with no credentials boots to the settings page. Verified against Emby 4.9 and Jellyfin 10.11.

Cast device: open the settings page and press Scan — Marquee discovers Google Cast devices on your LAN and you pick your Hub from a dropdown. (HUB_IP still works as an env fallback; discovery needs the container on the same network/VLAN as the Hub, which host networking gives you.)

Optional settings:

• PLEX_USERS — comma-separated Plex usernames that trigger the marquee. Leave empty to react to everyone on the server, including shared and home users (the sessions API is server-wide).
• PLEX_DEVICES — comma-separated player/device names that trigger the marquee; empty allows any device. Both filters are also editable live on the settings page, which shows the exact names of active sessions.
• BLOCK_TAGS — comma-separated do-not-cast words checked against each session's genres, tags, and content rating (e.g. adult, xxx, 18+, nc-17, tv-ma); a match is never cast. Case-insensitive; words of 3+ characters match inside terms, shorter ones match exactly. Also on the settings page.

When more than one allowed session is playing, each takes the display in turn. Rotate between sessions on the settings page sets how long each gets (default 30 seconds; 0 pins the first, ordered by user then device). Sessions are always sorted before one is picked, so the card never flips at random because the server reordered its session list.

• TMDB_API_KEY — enables the credits-scene badge
• FANART_API_KEY — container default for the Fanart template's key (the settings page value wins)
• POLL_SECONDS default 5
• SERVE_PORT default 8084
• REPO_DIR — the container sets /app (the code's own default is /repo)
• DATA_DIR — the container sets /config (the code's own default is REPO_DIR/output)

Env vars are defaults, not overrides

Some settings exist both as env vars and on the settings page. They all follow one rule:

Setting	Env var	Settings page	How they combine
Cast device	HUB_IP	Cast device picker	The settings page wins; the env var is the default when no device has been picked.
Users	PLEX_USERS	Plex users	Same rule: a typed list replaces the env var; a blank field inherits it.
Devices	PLEX_DEVICES	Devices	Same rule.
Do not cast	BLOCK_TAGS	Do not cast	Same rule.

The settings page shows each inherited env value as a greyed placeholder — jamison (from PLEX_USERS) — so a blank field reads as inheriting this rather than nothing is set, and typing a value (then clearing it later) behaves the way you'd expect. The placeholders come from /env-defaults, which serves those values and nothing else — an allowlist, so nothing credential-shaped can leak to a browser.

Health status is available at /healthz and includes the version.

Plex Token

1. Sign in to Plex Web and open an item on your server.
2. Select More (…) → Get Info → View XML.
3. Copy the value after X-Plex-Token= from the browser address bar.
4. Test it at http://PLEX-IP:32400/?X-Plex-Token=YOUR_TOKEN.

See Plex's token instructions. Never put a real token in Compose files, screenshots, issues, or commits.

For credits-scene badges, create a TMDb account, open Account Settings → API, request a key, and set TMDB_API_KEY.

Tips

Silence the cast chime. Every time Marquee takes over the display, the Nest Hub plays its connect sound. That chime comes from the device, not from Marquee, and there's a switch for it: open the Google Home app → tap your Hub → Settings (gear) → Accessibility → turn off Play sounds on start/end of casting. One-time change; casting is silent afterwards.

Community Forks & Related Projects

• TRusselo's fork — exploring Emby support, ESP32/ESPHome displays, Home Assistant integration, and vertical poster views. Independent project, not maintained or supported here, but worth a look if that's your stack.

Development

docker build -t marquee:test .
docker run --rm marquee:test python cast/cast.py --selftest
docker logs -f marquee

The service uses catt to launch DashCast on the Hub. Ratings come from Plex metadata; optional credits-scene keywords come from TMDb.

Cast behavior

Marquee checks that DashCast is active, casts the /image URL when playback starts, and releases the Hub when playback stops. Container tests cannot prove physical Hub behavior, so before publishing a release:

1. Open PAGE_URL from another LAN device.
2. Start a Plex movie or episode and confirm the Hub loads the card.
3. Pause and resume playback and confirm the progress state updates within one poll interval.
4. Stop playback and confirm the Hub returns to ambient mode.
5. Review docker logs marquee; there should be no catt ... failed message.

Credits

Marquee stands on generous shoulders:

• TRusselo — the Emby & Jellyfin backends, session filters and rotation, the dead-card heartbeat, the content filter, target-display preview presets, and a steady stream of sharp fixes.
• catt by Stavros Korokithakis — the casting engine that actually puts the card on your Hub (BSD, bundled stock).
• The Street template's weather effects adapt open CodePen techniques by sheepjs, Ivan Odintsov, Braeden Craig, and Tiff Wong — full notes and sources in CREDITS.md.

Support

Marquee is free and stays that way. If it makes your living room a little more cinematic, you can buy me a coffee ☕